In recent years safety measures have emerged as a critical factor for vehicles, and various vehicular child safety seats have been developed as a device for ensuring the safety of a new-born baby, an infant, a toddler and a child of school age (referred generally as "child" hereinafter) riding in a vehicle.
A schematic structure of a vehicular child safety seat is disclosed in Japanese Patent Application No. 9-289733 filed on Oct. 22, 1997 and laid-open on Sep. 22, 1998 under Japanese Patent Laying-Open No. 10-250426, by the same applicant as the present application. Japanese Patent Application 9-289733 corresponds to U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/004,699, filed on Jan. 8, 1998, which will be described herein with reference to present FIG. 8.
The vehicular child safety seat (hereinafter referred to as vehicular child safety seat) 100 includes a base 1 fixed by a seat belt (not shown) installed in the vehicle, and a seat apparatus 2 rotatably supported with respect to the base.
The seat apparatus 2 includes a seat portion 3 for supporting an infant, a back rest 4 coupled in a reclinable manner to the seat portion 3, and a head guard 5 for protecting the head of the child when the back rest is fully reclined backward.
A pair of arm rests 6 and 7 are provided on opposing sides of the seat portion 3, and a pair of side guards 8 and 9 are provided on opposing sides of the back rest 4. Further, support guards 10 and 11 for keeping or supporting the sides of the child's head are provided inside the pair of side guards 8 and 9.
The vehicular child safety seat 100 having the above described structure allows change in shape as the child grows. When the seat apparatus 2 is positioned laterally with respect to the direction of travel of the vehicle with the back rest 4 fully reclined backward, the child seat is so shaped as to provide a bed on which an infant can rest.
When the back rest 4 is raised, the seat apparatus 2 provides a sitting portion, and the vehicular child seat 100 can be used by a new-born baby, infant, toddler, to a child of a school age, with the seat apparatus 2 fixed on the base 1 facing forward or rearward.
As described above, with the vehicular child seat disclosed in Japanese Patent Application No. 9-289733 it is possible to provide a bed by rotating the seat apparatus 2 laterally with respect to the base 1 and by fully reclining the back rest 4. As a result, the child supporting surface formed by the seat 3 and the fully reclined back rest 4 extend lengthwise of a passenger car seat and crosswise to the car length.
Referring to present FIG. 9, when the vehicular child seat 100 is used as a bed and fixed on the seat 120 of a vehicle, the vehicular child seat 100 is inclined backward, as the seat 120 of the vehicle is generally inclined backward for the comfort of a seated passenger. However, a child resting in the vehicular child seat 100 used as a bed is also inclined laterally, and the child is forced to be in an unnatural posture in the vehicular child seat 100 because there is a tendency to roll into the corner formed by the child support surface and the backrest of the passenger seat 120.
The vehicular child seat 100 is fixed by a seat belt installed in the vehicle. When the base 1 of the vehicular child seat 100 is to be fixed by the seat belt, it is difficult to secure the vehicular child seat 100 on the seat of the vehicle unless the seat belt is exactly adjusted. Even then the problem of rolling into the above mentioned corner is not solved.